Lessons from Big Data London: All your employees should speak data

There were 150 seminars given at Big Data London, and lots of buzzwords and
on-trend topics flying between the event theaters. But one theme kept coming
up, from the technical talks to the business overviews and panel discussions:
leaders should encourage data access and interaction across their entire
organizations.

Encouraging an interest in business data is logical if we believe that data is
an organization's most valuable asset. But this is difficult, particularly for
legacy companies. Data exists, but in what form? What's available? What's its
structure? How reliable is it? How easy to access? The information landscape
is often disparate, with data stuck in silos generating dozens of disconnected
reports that make it difficult and time consuming to find real value.

Data sat in the cloud means nothing unless you enable your employees to use
it. A salesperson trying to create insights doesn't have time to check tens of
different resources and reports to mine value from disconnected data streams.

The very fact that organizations have so few people engaging in data is the
cause of a relatable BI dilemma: why is it so hard to get the data and insight
you need to make informed business decisions?

Data curiosity within non-technical teams is often stifled by hesitation, lack
of understanding, and confusion. This is because the notion of interacting
with data implies to the uninitiated a steep learning curve, filled with
impenetrable mathematics and statistics. Building a culture of data among
employees can run head-on into this wall of fear.

Companies need to create a single and shared point of truth where end users
and developers alike can search for and find data available to them. This
builds trust in data quality, and creates consistency in a common model that
becomes an interactive standard across your whole organization. If all your
data sources have one access point your ability to create value is far greater
than if they're scattered. A centralized platform ends the hundreds of varied
reports and ensures that everyone can sing from the same hymn sheet
regarding your company's data.

Data teams also need to be creative in presenting data-driven information to
the wider organization. Email updates containing entertaining statistics with
links back to a common dashboard allow everyone to understand and engage.
Simple Slack bots that retrieve key metrics and graphs are another easy way to
encourage employees to interact with reports and information.

Leaders should democratize data and employees' ability to discover and create
insights, not because it's trendy but because it's effective.The idea that a
data analyst is able to see everything and be the sole nexus of insights is
foolish; employees on the ground in your organization should be empowered to
make relevant discoveries. Establishing an open data culture in your
organization where employees across functional areas can work together, and
push discoveries up to business leadership allow companies to ultimately
create more value from their data.

The best data strategies enable collaboration. A system that allows teams to
see each others' work, share knowledge, and be able to start where someone
else finished makes your organization more agile. Collective data curiosity
avoids lost value from orphaned business problems, reduces decision-making
errors and duplicated work, and encourages innovation and positive change.

We're at the beginning of the data age. We are empowered to improve our
organizations by collecting and understanding data to advance processes and
solutions. Growing and expanding the number of people with access to data, and
empowering teams to explore and prepare it themselves is the best way to move
forward in a digital world where data-driven decisions will be at the heart of
every successful business.

Not sure where to start? Check out
What We Do to see if Hyperfine can help you begin
your data journey.